The invention relates to a method of transferring calls from a first station of a first telecommunications network comprising integrated call transfer means to a second station, while an auxiliary device automatically triggers an activation and/or deactivation control for said call transfer.
The invention also relates to a device intended to carry out call transfers from a station of a telecommunications network comprising integrated call transfer means to a mobile station of a radio communications network.
The invention is advantageously applied to call transfers effected between a fixed station of the conventional public switched network and a mobile station connected to a radio telecommunications network.
Such a method and device for call transfer are known notably from European patent application no. 0 639 034 A1. This document describes a method and a device for transferring calls from a mobile station of a radio communications network to another station. The call transfer is effected via the mobile station which communicates with the network by radio for this purpose. Call transfer instructions are then transmitted from the mobile station to call transfer means integrated with said radio communications network.
This method thus makes it necessary that all the incoming calls are intended for the mobile station which then automatically switches them to another station via the integrated transfer means of the radio communications network if the conditions for triggering a call transfer are satisfied.
This method, however, has a major drawback when the communication rates to a number of a mobile station are roughly higher than those intended for a fixed station number (which is currently the case). More particularly, in the case where an occasional use of a mobile station is provided, it is more advantageous for the calls to be systematically received by the fixed station and then transferred to the mobile station as required.
Indeed, according to the method described in cited document, the calling party always pays the price of a communication to a mobile station whatever the final receiving station. This may be detrimental in the case of calls of clients to a service provider who has a very competitive activity. The kind of example where this method is not satisfactory is that of a client choosing haphazardly a car service in his town in a telephone directory. The numbers of mobile stations being special numbers, the client will have a tendency of calling first a number of a fixed station.
It is an object of the invention to remedy this detrimental effect by providing a method and a device for call transfer which reduces the overcharge of the communications to a mobile station for the calling party. With this object, only the call number of the station to which a call costs the least is communicated to the calling parties. The call transfers are then automatically effected from this station to the mobile station to which the user can be connected and the cost of the communication from the first station to the mobile station is then billed to the called party.
The invention further provides to use call transfer means existing in a telecommunications network to which a station called fixed station whose incoming communications are not expensive is connected and to control these call transfer means by remote control in a manner transparent to the calling party via an auxiliary electronic device connected to this network.
For this purpose, a method of the type mentioned in the opening paragraph is characterized in that said control is triggered by the transmission of predefined messages from said auxiliary device which have said integrated transfer means for their destination.
According to an important characteristic feature of the invention, a method of the type described above is characterized in that it comprises a detection step for detecting the presence of said mobile radio station by said auxiliary device for triggering said control. Thus, when the mobile station is detected, the calls are normally received by the fixed station. If not, they are automatically transferred from the fixed station to the mobile station at the expense of the called party.
The invention also provides an auxiliary device as mentioned in the opening paragraph, characterized in that it comprises means for transmitting call transfer activation and/or deactivation messages to said integrated transfer means and means for keeping said messages in the memory.
Preferably, this device is integrated with a battery charger intended to receive a mobile station.
These and other aspects of the invention will be apparent from and elucidated with reference to the embodiments described hereinafter.